Student Picks: Details - Finding Patterns in Nature

Student Picks is a SCMA program in which Smith students organize their own one-day art show using our collection of works on paper. This month’s student curator and guest blogger Sharon Pamela Santana ‘14 discusses her show “Details: Finding Patterns in Nature” which will be on view this Friday March 1 from 12-4 PM in the Cunningham Center for the Study of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs. We hope to see you here! 

Have you ever stopped to absorb and contemplate your surroundings? Have you ever paid attention to the elements that make up your existence?

My Student Picks exhibition is inspired by patterns found in nature: simple, complicated, regular, and irregular. While images of very different elements such as vegetables and landscapes are included in the exhibition, they all speak to the splendor of the simple things in our environment. Viewers will find that in the end, nature comes together beautifully and even an artichoke on our plates can be an admirable work of art. I would like you to join me in the observation and appreciation of patterns in nature.

Works by artists such as Ansel Adams and Edward Weston are included in Details: Finding Patterns in Nature primarily for their sharp and contrasted attention to detail and their overall beauty. I enjoyed viewing and choosing these exquisite photographs, and I hope that viewers too will enjoy looking at them. I would like to thank the Smith College Museum of Art for the wonderful and fun opportunity to curate this Student Picks exhibition.

As viewers can take the time to view these photographs, they may reflect on the following: If you ever think your life has become uneventful, and your everyday activities lose their excitement, think again. Observe, identify, and appreciate the shapes and colors in your surroundings. You will find that there is actually so much more to your daily routines when you open your eyes and look at the world around you with intention.

^{Ansel Easton Adams. American, 1902–1984. Death Valley from Zabriski Point, 1942. Gelatin silver print. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Beaumont Newhall (Nancy Parker, class of 1930). Photography by Petegorsky/Gipe. SC 1951.189.}

^{Ansel Easton Adams. American, 1902–1984. Water and Foam from Portfolio Three: Yosemite Valley, ca. 1955 negative; 1960 print. Gelatin silver print mounted on Strathmore illustration board. Photography by Petegorsky/Gipe. SC 1973.80.8.}

^{Edward Weston. American, 1886–1958. Artichoke Halved, 1930. Gelatin silver print mounted on paperboard. Gift of Mrs. Edwin H. Land. Photography by Petegorsky/Gipe. SC 1996.22.6.}

^{Ansel Easton Adams. American, 1902–1984. Trees and Snow, from Portfolio Three: Yosemite Valley, print 1960. Gelatin silver print mounted on Strathmore illustration board. Date and source of acquisition unknown. Photography by Petegorsky/Gipe. SC 1973.80.4.}